Ways of Working Nudge

The Viable Systems Model by Stafford Beer, is a great mental model to understand scaling of complex systems (people and machines). It is a model of a viable system (duh!). Ashby's Law: "Only variety can absorb variety".

Complex environments need complex responses.
A system (people and machine) must be as complex as the system it is trying to control.

Small groups of people, in a simple context, can be governed simply.
Large groups, in complex contexts, need more advanced governance if there is a desire to optimise for specific outcomes (over Brownian Motion or chaos or collapse).

Hence the word 'organisation' to refer to a company. A group of people, affiliated to a brand, who are organised, not disorganised.

This is what happened in the 3rd Industrial Revolution, with the introduction of Systematic Management. It was the strengthening of System 2, 3, 4 and 5, the introduction of 'line (system 1) and staff (system 2, 3, 4, 5)' at scale, as industrial organisations grew larger than they had ever been before.

💡 System 1: Primary activities (with autonomy, and system 2 and 3 ensure that it is aligned autonomy) e.g. heart, lungs

💡 System 2: Coordination (feedback loop) e.g. sympathetic nervous system

💡 System 3: Delivery Management (optimise resources for the whole) e.g. Pons, Medulla in the brain

💡 System 4: Development (what is the future going to bring?) e.g. Ganglia, sight, hearing, taste, smell

💡 System 5: Purpose & Policy (What is the Why? What is the purpose of the system?) e.g. Cerebal Cortex

Strategy is system 3, 4 and 5.

The Viable Systems Model is recursive. Each System 1 is itself a Viable System containing System 1, 2, 3, 4 & 5.

LinkedIn post here, Bluesky here

Regards, Jon